MLS Unveiled gave us logos and jerseys, but it also gave the first confirmation of the size and breadth of its player pool.
Under the glare of flashing lights, Jesus Jones’ “Right Here, Right Now” blaring over the sound system and the obligatory flock of kids, Major League Soccer chairman Alan Rothenberg unveiled his pet project in New York City Oct. 17.
There were sponsor announcements, logos and soccer uniforms modeled by a handful of new signings: U.S. stars Tony Meola, Mike Sorber, Roy Wegerle and John Harkes being the latest to hitch their wagons to the MLS train.
Yet after the dry ice filled the Palladium ballroom and a giant inflatable Mitre ball has descended from the ceiling, what was really unveiled by the mandarins of MLS?
Obviously, you need more than logos and trendy, dark soccer jerseys to make a league fly. Primarily, you need players. MLS currently has a list of about 57 players, about one-third of the number it needs to stock 10 teams. While the more illustrious names are signed to fixed contracts, the remainder are on option deals — which means they will have to be picked up by a specific team or released by the league.
You also need coaches. To date, MLS has one. Ron Newman will add the much-maligned nickname of the Kansas City Wiz to his lengthy resume of coaching credentials, while both Virginia’s Bruce Arena (Washington) and Portugal’s Tony Simoes (San Jose) are quietly touted as near-future signings.
In terms of players, MLS director of player development Dave Dir has been scouting U.S.-based players, while deputy commissioner Sunil Gulati has had the mammoth undertaking of signing up U.S. national team and foreign players. Closest to the heart of MLS have been members of the 1994 U.S. World Cup squad.
“Signing players like [Alexi] Lalas, Harkes and a number of other World Cup players has been our goal from the beginning,” said Rothenberg in a teleconference from New York. “We knew that if we signed these key people, then we’d be well on our way.
“With respect to the number of high quality international [signings], I think we’re on our way but we’re not quite there yet. Unfortunately, the likes of Pele, Cruyff and Beckenbauer really don’t exist any more. And I’d rather have permanent young players stay for life in the MLS, rather than a player at the end of his career for a couple of mercenary seasons.”
No Europeans among first foreign signings
Gulati has made foreign signings, though none is European. American fans —
who’ll see 36 games on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2, including a Thursday night Game of the Week on ESPN2 — will be able to catch Bolivian stars Marco Antonio Etcheverry and Chicho Suarez. They’ll also get Mexico’s Jorge Campos and Hugo Sanchez, along with a smattering of African players (Morocco goalkeeper Khalil Azmi and Nigerians Michael Emenalo and Uche Okafor) next spring.
“We’ve been saying we want attacking, entertaining soccer, and that we’d be looking primarily south, so it was no surprise that Campos was our first international player and that our first group of international players are from Africa and South America,” said Gulati. “What we’ve said from Day 1 is we’ll build this league around American players and a sprinkling of international stars and that’s what we’ve done. We’ll have some from Europe, but that’s not the principal focus.
“We’re actively signing a number of players from all around the world and we’re continuing that process on a daily basis.”
There will more Bolivians. Gulati said a cooperation agreement of sorts had been reached with Rolando Aguilera, owner of the Bolivian youth soccer academy Tahuichi, which produced both Suarez and Etcheverry. Other players in the MLS rumor mill include Colombian midfielder Carlos Valderrama and Mexican marksman Carlos Hermosillo.
Bringing home U.S. internationals has been the top priority because Lalas, Tab Ramos, Sorber, Harkes and Wegerle are all — in MLS’s eyes — marquee names.
In some cases, contract negotiations have been complex. Harkes, for example, has an agreement whereby MLS will buy out his contract with England’s Derby County and will lend him to either Premier Division club West Ham or Coventry for the remainder of the season.
Lalas will see out his season with Italy’s Padova, remaining there until such time as Padova has been assured of staying up or going down (a strong possibility given its horrendous start). If he stays until the end of the Italian season, he would not arrive until five weeks after the MLS’s April 6 curtain-raiser in Spartan Stadium, home of the San Jose Clash.
In the past, MLS has farmed players out to other clubs, but with the league’s commencement less than six months away, that window of loan opportunity no longer exists.
Consequently, Wegerle, having left England’s Coventry City, will join U.S. coach Steve Sampson and between six and eight other senior players in San Diego, where he’ll train with the Olympic team for possible consideration as an over-age player at next summer’s Atlanta games. He will also be in preparation for the CONCACAF Gold Cup in January.
Chess on multiple boards
Then there is the consideration of which teams to allocate core players to.
Franchises will initially have four key players to work with — two American and two international stars.
Some players were assigned immediately: Wegerle to Denver and the Colorado Rapids, Harkes to Washington’s D.C. United, Mike Burns and Lalas to the New England Revolution and the veteran but non-mercenary Sanchez to the Dallas Burn. It’s a complicated business.
“[Allocation is conducted in the] interests of players, the league and the owners,” said Gulati “There is no single overriding factor.
“In John’s [Harkes] case he was the player Washington wanted. John wanted New York and Washington in that order. Tab [Ramos] was already in New York, so Washington became an obvious choice. Roy [Wegerle] had a choice of Denver and Dallas. Sanchez had a choice of San Jose and Dallas. It’s a case of playing chess on multiple boards.”
“The stage where we’re signing players is kind of back and forth. The league places players, we talk with each of the teams beforehand and a competition committee confirms these appointments. By then the players have talked with the general manager or owners, who have talked about what they were looking for. The final decision is signed by the league subject to confirmation by the competition committee … but for U.S. national team players, it’s part of the package to give them some kind of choice.”
Several teams — the Columbus Crew (who were rumored to have passed on Etcheverry), San Jose and the Tampa Bay Mutiny — have yet to name a player. The games of multiple-board chess will continue over the coming months, but without hired coaches to advise on player selection, the process is more difficult.
“I’ve put new teams together before in Dallas and Fort Lauderdale [the NASL’s Tornado and Strikers, respectively],” said Newman, the league’s solitary coaching appointee. “San Diego [the outdoor Sockers] I inherited — so I know the way it works. But this is the first time I’ve got to put a team together when I don’t quite know what I’ll be getting.
“I do believe there’s a lot to be said for every player registering. The idea is to give everyone an equal share of the talent. We have to be careful. [Wiz owner] Lamar [Hunt] is also very concerned that no one team puts a squad together and then goes off on a two-month tour of South America when other people can’t do that. The biggest key is to keep the parity right to begin with.” Some franchises — the Los Angeles Galaxy and Dallas — can rely on Campos and Sanchez to bring in ethnic fans, but Newman has no pocket of international support to draw from.
“We don’t have [a big ethnic market],” he said. “We’ve had several offers of players. But who would draw in Kansas? O.J Simpson would. Put him at center forward and we’d be pulling ’em in. Seriously, we’d be better off with a big-name American player around.”
Newman got his wish on the eve of the MLS unveiling with the arrival of Sorber — only marginally less famous than O.J. — from Mexico’s Pumas.
For Newman and the other nine coaches that MLS will conjure out of the ether, the selection and signing process has a fixed time limit. On Jan. 6, MLS will stage what it has grimly christened The Combine at a site to be determined. This attempt to sort the soccer-playing wheat from the chaff will be the end of the line for the hotchpotch of option players and diamonds-in-the-rough who want to play for MLS.
Coaches and players will then have three months to get down to the real business of what Major League Soccer is all about — its inaugural season.
by Soccer America Senior Editor Duncan Irving